I actually own the thing (hell you may own it too), but the ST8 AP3 barrage shot lacks predictability. Now if we are talking about a huge blob of enemies where you can never miss, that's cool, but generally speaking it's not a reliable enemy stomper. The 7 Inch D is ALWAYS handy depending on the enemy. Especially Necron Deathstars and Canoptic wraithstars.

However, if you are facing an enemy with NO Superheavies, with a hoard of low AS units, I can see how this will be plenty useful. If your concern is ignores cover... why don't you have markerlight support? It's not like Ignores Cover is hard to come by in our army.

A good example would be an Orc Mob. Drop the center of the blast on their big vehicles that are surrounded by a large number of scrubs. If it's OT, you have a +3 to blow it to bits from the 10/1 center ordnance shot. Everything around it takes a 7/4 (usually enough to kill hardboys dead) and the 5/5 for the scrubs. EVERYTHING THAT TAKES A WOUND MUST MAKE AN INITIATIVE TEST. If they fail, BS1/WS1 for the next round. This screws just about everything over if it's not eldar.

Don't forget you have your handy arm weapons to boot, usually enough to kill anything smaller then you. After thinking about it...yeah I consider these a worthy weapon.

Everyone here arguing over which weapon system is best, and I'm just sitting here like, "boy, I could buy that Pulse Ordnance Multi-Driver and break it up into individual guns for some sweet Gue'vesa Basilisks..."

Railgun up and available to buy on Forgeworld, rules are available to view as well.Mass-induction targeting rule is interesting, allows you to really try and kill an individual model, pushing for the Deathblow result and trying to avoid the No Damage result. Cluster shells are alright, not great though.Overall, a reasonable weapon with a specific role of superheavy killing, though I still think I prefer the Pulse Ordinance Multi-Driver

Interestingly the Railcannon is two weapons. The main mode is a Blast S:D AP1 shot that rolls two and picks the highest on the Destroyer table, so it's good for one-banging a single target. The Cluster Thingy is just some S6 AP4 Apoc Barrage shots with Pinning, so nice anti-infantry, but nothing to write home about.

Imo the 'Pulse ordnance multi-driver' outshines the 'Heavy rail cannon array' unless you REALLY need to kill that enemy GC/Super Heavy with that one shot. GW seem to hate Railweaponry (another great opportunity gone to introduce the beam special rule to rail weapons even )

Tbh I never really thought it would make sense to have Rail weapons be a beam. If they're cutting through multiple units they're imparting minimal kinetic force upon each one. You want it to pierce the armour and have the round explode in a storm of interior spalling if you really want to confirm a kill, as modern APFSDS rounds do.

CoffeeGrunt wrote:Tbh I never really thought it would make sense to have Rail weapons be a beam. If they're cutting through multiple units they're imparting minimal kinetic force upon each one. You want it to pierce the armour and have the round explode in a storm of interior spalling if you really want to confirm a kill, as modern APFSDS rounds do.

I think some field testing of this new weapon, as compared to the pulse weapon, will be required. I see a few things that I like about the design of this weapon.

1) Range. Obviously, in normal 40k, this isn't going to matter, but in Apocalypse, even 72" sometimes feels a little short. 120" is definitely something that will cover most of a 6'x8' board.

2) Blast: This means that against the targets you're likely to aim at, you are probably not going to miss. I think that rule is less of "shoot once" and more of "you won't miss big targets". And of course, wrecking and squad that just arrived by deep strike and didn't have the smarts to run (if you've nothing better to do).

3) AP 1: For those moments when you don't get a six, a better chance of still doing more damage.

4) Mass Induction Targeting: I think this will be a devastating rule. As someone pointed out, this means only a 1/36 chance of failing to do something. And about a 1/3 chance of getting that sweet six.

5) Cluster shells: This may be the most useful aspect of this weapon over the pulse ordnance multi-driver. The weakness of the pulse weapon is that you have to choose which shot you want. WIth this you get both! Individually, they have weaknesses against their counterparts, but the fact that you get to shoot them together I think will show itself to be very powerful.

Last thought: It strikes me that the pulse and rail weapons serve a different purpose. The rail weapon is for one-shotting enemy superheavies (without the need for lots of markerlights like the stormsurge). The pulse weapon is for dealing with deathstars.

More importantly, one can use the rail weapon in the ITC. Bwahaha!

All in all, I'm exited and I'm getting one of these weapons. If only to finally have a mainstay rail weapon back in my army!

Too bad it was not a heavy railgun. The blast prevents the taunar to shoot at super heavy fliers and flying GC and with a 3'' blast, could have difficulties to shoot at small apoc units like ctan . I would have preferred a solid shot, maybe with a bs increase if necessary.But the mass induction rule allow more potential against other super heavies.The pulse remain more useful against anything and the nexus is not efficient enouh.

Why a points increase for the Ta'unar? It's not like it doesn't get eviscerated by grav and other way more powerful stuff. I guess that means every other thing will be further nerfed as well. I actually like the Heavy Railcannnon a lot and it has its uses, but the Pulse Driver is still the go to weapon for the majority of encounters. Then again if my opponent brings a titan I could dedicate the railcannon to taking it down and it still offers good fire support capabilities. *scraps plans to buy more forgeworld*

The downside is the small blast meaning it will need a ton of markerlight support which brings further costs to the weapon. I'm not sure if I want it or not... I even went out of my way to buy a damn drill and magnets and everything just for the heavy railgun array.

Jacket wrote:Why a points increase for the Ta'unar? It's not like it doesn't get eviscerated by grav and other way more powerful stuff. I guess that means every other thing will be further nerfed as well. I actually like the Heavy Railcannnon a lot and it has its uses, but the Pulse Driver is still the go to weapon for the majority of encounters. Then again if my opponent brings a titan I could dedicate the railcannon to taking it down and it still offers good fire support capabilities. *scraps plans to buy more forgeworld*

The downside is the small blast meaning it will need a ton of markerlight support which brings further costs to the weapon. I'm not sure if I want it or not...

Because it's too cheap. It has more or less the durability and firepower of a barebones Warhound Titan, which costs 150p more than it.

Jacket wrote:Why a points increase for the Ta'unar? It's not like it doesn't get eviscerated by grav and other way more powerful stuff. I guess that means every other thing will be further nerfed as well. I actually like the Heavy Railcannnon a lot and it has its uses, but the Pulse Driver is still the go to weapon for the majority of encounters. Then again if my opponent brings a titan I could dedicate the railcannon to taking it down and it still offers good fire support capabilities. *scraps plans to buy more forgeworld*

The downside is the small blast meaning it will need a ton of markerlight support which brings further costs to the weapon. I'm not sure if I want it or not...

Because it's too cheap. It has more or less the durability and firepower of a barebones Warhound Titan, which costs 150p more than it.

Did they say how much they were going to increase it by? With anti-titan loadout Warhound wins most matches against the Ta'unar with its pulse Ordinance Driver. I am bad at mathhammer so I have no idea if the Railcannon will be better or worse for taking one down.

EditI just bought one. Haha. I didn't go through all this prep-work with getting my drill and magnets for nothing.